The Extra

The Extra (2005)

No one knew his name... They still don't.

Jimeoin, in the title role, plays a man fixated on the concept of celebrity, or more accurately, how he can become one. He is passionate about being a celebrity, but unfortunately he just isn't very talented. After trying to secure roles in myriad productions he finally finds employment as an extra, and what follows is his misadventures as he becomes involved with shady business men, producers and mobsters all of whom are fixated with show business.

Date of release
2005-04-21
TMDB
7.5 / 10 (2)
Runtime
1h 36m
Genres
Drama, Comedy
Director
Kevin Carlin

Casting

Interesting facts

  • Box office: A$749.1K

The Extra is a 2005 Australian film starring Irish comedian Jimeoin and based on the twice AACTA nominated & Tropfest awarded 1999 Tooting Bec produced short film The Extra, starring Peter Phelps, Julia Zemiro.

Production

Original Production of the 2005 feature film was delayed due to a successful plagiarism claim between the earlier short films’ producer regarding the storyline, its origins and title. An out of court settlement was reached after the feature film’s producer, Bruno Charlesworth admitted to the short film’s claims but unsuccessfully tried to impose a gag order on the short film’s win.

Jimeoin says he was interested in writing the film because he wanted to explore the nature of fame. He admitted that In 1999, he had had multiple meetings with producers and the short film’s director about plans to co-develop the original The Extra into a feature film.

He says it took five years to write the script

I work on them really slowly. I do a lot of stand-up, so time's at a minimum, and then, after two years I looked at it and thought it was the wrong thing I wanted to do - so I started again, and got it done within a year and a half after that. I then noticed I had two stories mixed into one, so I had to pick one story over the other - that's probably why it took five years, I had to realise that...

Jimeon was involved in the casting progress.

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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